Zibaldone

by Leopardi, Giacomo

  For p. 2685, margin. Δέω [to want], δέον [needful], etc., also means mancare mancante [to be missing], etc., and this is more or less its meaning in the expressions mentioned, so that they are the same as the Italian ones cited. Similarly the French falloir properly means mancare (from the Latin fallere, Spanish faltar, Italian fallire, fallare, etc., and in French also faillir), and it brings together the meanings of mancare and bisognare exactly like the Greek δέω [to want], or the impersonal δεῖ [one must]. A similarity which must not be overlooked, nor can it be chance, etc. In the expressions cited its meaning is likewise the same as mancare. In Greek, it is also simply rendered as ὀλίγου, ὀλίγον, μικροῦ, without the verb δεῖν [to want], for fere, quasi [almost], etc., as we do with per poco and di poco [almost] without another verb. See the Crusca under di poco and under per, § 98, and the Greek Lexicons. “Poco manca che Senofonte non ci ritragga” [“Xenophon almost depicts”], etc. Speroni, Dialoghi, Venice 1596, p. 224, end. Il s’en faut tant ou tant, il s’en faut plus de la moitié, il s’en faut peu, il s’en faut la moitié ec., il s’en faut bien, il s’en faut de beaucoup, il s’en faut beaucoup ec. il s’en faudrait beaucoup ec.1 In Greek it is also rendered independently of the subject as ὀλίγου [3818] δέον, μικροῦ, πολλοῦ δέον. Or in agreement with the subject ὀλίγου δέοντα, δέοντες, etc. Or, e.g., δυοῖν δέοντα εἴκοσι [wanting two of twenty] that is eighteen, etc., ὀλίγου δέον ἶσος [to be little short of equal], that is almost equal, etc. Greek also says παρὰ μικρὸν ἐδέησα τοῦτο ποιεῖν [I was little short of being able to do it] which corresponds exactly to our per poco mancai di far questo: or di poco, etc. See the Lexicons under δέω [to want]. See the expressions forming part of these remarks in the Alberti Dictionary, etc., under faillir, and manquer, and see the Spanish dictionaries under faltar, etc. We must make reference here to our di gran lunga and d’assai (à beaucoup près) [by a long way] in those expressions: egli non è di gran lunga, or d’assai, così grande (beaucoup s’en faut). Or ei non fu, etc. (beaucoup s’en fallut, etc.). Where the verb mancare or its like is suppressed, as in the Greek expressions ὀλίγου or ὀλίγον ἀπέθανεν [he almost died], μικροὺ ἀπόλωλα [I am almost dead] and the like, where the verb δεῖν is omitted. Πολλοῦ [much] I do not think is used absolutely in the same way. (3 Nov. 1823.)

  For p. 3573. This proposition is very risky.1 It is to be understood in a broad sense. In relation to French it is true, generally speaking. But in relation to Italian, I am not sure that it is even generally true, once the extrinsic similarities of Italian and Spanish with Latin are compared. The sound of Spanish has more of the Latin to it, but this is practically an illusion of the senses. Because those sorts of Latin sounds in Spanish are not in the same places that they were in Latin. For example the vast number of s’s contributes, perhaps more than anything else, to make the one language sound like the other. But Spanish abounds in ss, principally because in Spanish [3819] all the plurals end in that letter. Not so in Latin. (It is true however that in Latin the ending in s is proper to all nonneuter plural accusatives. Now, according to Perticari, Latin nouns transposed into the daughter languages, are all formed from the accusatives of the respective Latin declensions.1 So the fact that in Spanish the ending in s is characteristic of its plurals, could come from Latin, and thus itself be Latin. And this observation may carry great weight in confirming Perticari’s opinion—though he talks only of singulars, which being formed from the Latin accusative then generate our kinds of plurals—while others apparently more logical, though perhaps with less truth, claim that our nouns are Latin ablatives.2 E.g., amore, etc. But in truth it is not obvious why, if the use of other cases has to have been lost, and only one to remain for all, as has happened in the modern languages, and as must have happened, certainly in most instances, in ancient vulgar and spoken Latin, the use of the ablative should prevail. While it makes sense that the accusative should be used instead of the other cases, etc., see p. 3907.) Always adding es to singulars which ended in a consonant is not Latin usage, except in certain cases, and in the third declension. (For the ending of plurals we imitate Latin nominatives of the second and the first declensions. So that as far as the ending of plurals is concerned, it cannot be said that the similarity of Spanish to Latin, even if we assume and allow that it exists, as above, is any greater than that of Italian. Besides that continuous s that one hears in Spanish makes a sound which all things considered is as little or as much like Latin as the continuous vowel endings in Italian. Latin combines both the latter and the former, and also many other endings at the same time, so that actually its sound, even speaking generally and in the abstract, is neither that of Italian nor that of Spanish. It is certainly true that in Spanish words ending in a consonant are intermingled with words ending in a vowel, as in Latin, while in Italian nearly all words end in a vowel; and that in Spanish, although the s ending is the most frequent, at least among endings in a consonant, there are nevertheless different consonantal endings, as there are in Latin, but none that do not also belong, I think, to Latin—unlike in French, German, etc.—though not always, in fact in a minority of instances, in the same cases; and the vowel endings are stressed on the penultimate syllable as in Latin and are not acute, that is truncated, as in French. From these points of view the sound of Spanish really is more similar to Latin than is not only French, but even Italian. And these are the reasons why if you hear Spanish it is more readily confused with Latin, than is French, or indeed Italian. And this effect, from these points of view, is not an illusion, nor is it something that is not worth considering, nor something that does not have a principle and a reason for its similarity or actual resemblance. The consonant ending in d which is frequent in Spanish is rare in Latin but it does exist, as in ad, illud, id, istud, sed, etc.)3 Besides, in French too (though only in written French) the ending in s (and singulars ending with a consonant can sometimes have es added, if I am not mistaken) is characteristic of the plural (the s is also present in the x ending), so that in this area it could be said that Spanish does not prevail over French, except insofar as Spanish always pronounces the s, and French only occasionally, and more by chance than for any other reason. As for [3820] Italian, even in the regular forms of conjugations, in many things it is much more consistent with Latin than Spanish is. See, e.g., pp. 3699–701 and my theory of continuatives where there is discussion of the Aeolic digamma in amaϝi, etc. And suffice it to observe that Spanish only has three conjugations. Italian has all four, and all of them, in many characteristics, corresponding to the respective Latin conjugations, as in the infinitives āre, ēre, ĕre, īre (Spanish is missing the third and only has truncated forms of the others), and in other areas. French, too, has four conjugations, but they do not correspond to the Latin conjugations (except the one in ir in relation to the infinitive, etc.), and having the same number (that is there being 4 of them as in Latin) seems like pure chance, and perhaps it is. And I seriously doubt—when it comes to preserving Latinity in thousands and thousands of rules or particular words considered from a material point of view, or phrases also considered from a material point of view (because here we are talking about extrinsic things), and meanings and uses of words and phrases that originated or have always existed in popular and spoken language, not just in illustrious language, etc.—whether Spanish can be placed above Italian, or even indeed on a par with it. One word or another, etc., may be more Latin in Spanish than in Italian (and so it can happen sometimes in French too that a word is more Latin than in the two sister languages, or one of them, or that the two sisters or one of them do not have a word which is preserved in French, but no one will say on that account that Latinity is better preserved in French than in its sisters, or than in one of them), one or another Latin word will remain in Spanish, and be missing in Italian. But, doing all the sums and taking the contrary instances into ac
count, and putting it all together, I believe that in all these things Italian prevails over Spanish by a very long way. (3 November 1823.)

  [3821] Positivized diminutives. Orbiculatus [circular], orbiculatim [in circles], reticulatus [netlike, reticulated], vermiculatus [worm-eaten, vermiculated], etc. (3 Nov. 1823), if in fact they are not frequentatives in meaning as I have pointed out generally elsewhere [→Z 1240–42].

  For p. 3156—if you consider that even the sentimental in Lord Byron’s work—the part which has to do with the play of passions, the heart, the expression, depiction, imitation of men’s characters and feelings, the knowledge and understanding of the human spirit, the inner man, etc. (which Lord Byron’s poems abound in to the highest degree, of which they are indeed composed)—makes very little impact on its readers, and in truth is scarcely designed to be communicated to the minds of others. And the reason is precisely that it appears to be, and perhaps it is, dictated by the imagination rather than by feelings and the heart, imagined rather than felt, imagined rather than true, invented rather than imitated or conjectured, created rather than portrayed and expressed, and all in all there is assuredly more fancy in it than passion and feeling, and it is by its nature more suited and disposed to work on the imagination than on the heart of those who read it. And it would seem Lord Byron wanted it to be so, and that is exactly what happens. And for that reason its effect is weak, that is not very intimate, and therefore short-lived, although it can be very strong at first acquaintance, something that is not incompatible with superficiality. The effect of Lord Byron’s poems, so greatly and perpetually and extremely sentimental, the effect of the sentimental in those poems, is not sentimental for the reasons mentioned. Now, as we can see, this is why what moves the author and the poems does not run very deep and has difficulty in communicating, for it is something that is almost incapable of acting except on the imagination, but the [3822] imagination of readers today is generally not well suited to receiving strong, therefore intimate and lasting impressions: which is what I said, and is the purpose of these remarks. And when what moves poems and poets is only or principally concerned with the imagination—whether it arises solely from imagination in the poet and has been located there exclusively, or whether only through imagination can it act upon the readers and cannot communicate other than imaginatively (this is more likely our case, because I believe that Lord Byron really does feel, that he does not just imagine, and indeed the excess and extraordinary force and quality of his feelings is what damages him)—it is very difficult for it to communicate with today’s readers, and then only in small part and not very energetically. It was certainly very different among the ancients (we also see it in fact today in children and young people who have little experience of the world, or who are in their early youth, when youth, in practice, does not yet philosophize, as all do at other times of their life, or after some experience; that is, today everyone philosophizes, in relation to life, etc., some in theory and in practice, others in the latter only). Today even the greatest ancient poets quickly tire us and leave us high and dry, if and when they are no more than fanciful, even though in this very thing they are supreme, extraordinary, and full of art. Lord Byron’s poems bore us and leave us cold to a greater extent, and more quickly, because of the great sameness that you feel in them, which may be true, and may come from a lack of the true subtle poetic art (so well and distinctly known and so excellently and magisterially practiced by the ancients). It could also be that it is apparent, and arises solely from continuous excess in all things, from the continual intensity, from the continuous extraordinary emphasis [3823] of each part. Which on the one side produces the effect of sameness, and it truly is like that, insofar as it is continual excess, etc., even though it is as varied as you like in its subjects, qualities, etc. On the other side it tires as does sameness, because it wears people’s minds down too much. They very quickly stop being able to keep up with the poet’s enthusiasm, as sight quickly tires of colors which are all very vivid, although they are both beautiful and varied, and because what is of high intensity and ἀθρόον [overwhelming], no matter how excellent, quickly tires one, just as the person who drinks at a single draught a jug of liquor has immediately quenched his thirst, and even if you were to offer him another different and most exquisite liquor, he has no wish to taste it, for he has lost for the moment the faculty of taking pleasure from drinking, and from agreeable liquors. Just as in the body so also in the mind the faculty and the power to experience pleasure is meager. One must husband it carefully, or it is very quickly exhausted. The body and soul yield and give way to overwhelming pleasure, as they do to overwhelming pain. Pleasurable things are very rare, and pleasures small indeed. But even if they were much more frequent and much greater.1 Neither the human body nor the human mind has the strength to enjoy more than a certain amount, and even independently of the inurement which renders indifferent those feelings which were originally pleasurable or painful, even when the pleasures and the pains retain their strength, man lacks the capacity to feel them, if they are too great, or if there are too many of them, etc. The capacity to suffer is much greater in man. And yet if the pain is overwhelming, neither the human body nor the human mind is capable of feeling it, and do not suffer, or only for a short space of time, after which their capacity to suffer weakens. Man cannot enjoy a great amount, not only because pleasures are few and small, [3824] but also in relation to himself, because he has an extremely limited capacity for pleasure, and those pleasures which do come along, so small and few, are sufficient to surpass his capacity by a long way. Bacchus and Venus are pleasures, but after a quarter of an hour, etc., man becomes incapable of enjoying them, and succumbs to their power no less than to the power of sufferings and diseases. (3 Nov. 1823.)

  Supreme conformability of man, etc. Everything in nature, and especially in man, is according to disposition, etc. The extraordinary, and, apparently more than human faculty and power which people who are blind, whether by nature or having become so, have in their ears, in retentiveness, in inventiveness, in attention, in profundity of thought, in learning music and practicing and composing it, etc. etc. Similarly with deaf people in attention, in application and concentration of thought, in learning things which appear impossible for people born deaf, even reading, writing, perhaps talking too, etc., as occurs in schools for the deaf-mute,1 etc. Which extraordinary powers of the moral parts, that are discovered in man just through force of circumstance, and sometimes in the same individual who at first did not have them, such as in a person who became blind at a certain age, etc., are analogous to those, equally extraordinary, of the physical parts, also caused by mere circumstances, and which can be believed to be physically possible in man, only insofar as an individual can in fact be seen who through force of his circumstances, has succeeded in possessing them. Like the one born without arms, who compensated with his feet for all the functions of the hands, even for the most refined.2 No one can in fact imagine that man and his respective moral [3825] or physical parts are in any way capable of such powers, except by seeing or learning the facts one by one. I say the same about a hundred thousand other extraordinary moral or physical faculties possessed today or in times gone by individuals, or races, or particular nations, simply through force of circumstances, or through practice, or through customs, etc. Like the faculties now shown by Indian jugglers, which in the past were shown by Mexican jugglers,1 etc., by our tumblers, acrobats, and also conjurors, etc. And what I say about these faculties should also be said of the extraordinary moral and physical qualities, of customs, of extraordinary practices of every sort, etc., or which are extraordinary for us, etc. (4 Nov. 1823.)

  It is not only in Italian and French, etc. (as in châtelet [small castle]), that positivized diminutives have a diminutive form, as I have said elsewhere [→Z 3636], whether they come from Latin or not, positivized in Latin or modern languages, etc.; but even in Latin itself, like flabellulum [fan], if it is a genuine word, and I beli
eve many others. Sellula [stool]. Asellulus [ass]. Besides even nonpositivized diminutives often end up having a diminutive in Latin as in Italian, etc., if I am not mistaken. Puella [girl], although it is a word which expresses something little to be petted, etc., is still a positivized diminutive in that it remains in use on its own in place of its obsolete positive puera, for which see Forcellini. And puella has a diminutive form puellula. (4 Nov. 1823.)

  For p. 3757. They are formed from the other supines, though they are much rarer, where the um changes to ibilis, as flexibilis, inflexibilis from flexum, etc., passibilis, etc., sensibilis, insensibilis, etc. In barbarian Latin, and in the modern languages it is normal to form such verbal adjectives [3826] in the same way from supines in impure tum, that is, substituting ibilis for the um, as in fattibile, perfettibile, indefettibile, etc., from perfectum, defectum, factum. But it is not so in good Latin, or even were there some similar example, it would be from a more modern period, etc. Good Latin writers would have said facibilis from facitum, as we also say concepibile [conceivable] inconcepibile, etc. (concevable, etc.), from concepitum, while we also say percettibile impercettibile, etc., from perceptum; and we say reperibile [findable] from reperitum, not repertibile from repertum, etc. Regularly and primitively no Latin supine ends in impure tum. So this formation is not Latin. See pp. 3904, 3928.

  Besides, these observations on the forms of verbal adjectives in bilis also serve to confirm our propositions on the ancient and regular state of supines, both in general, and for each of such verbal adjectives in particular, that is of those which fit our purpose, etc. (4 Nov. 1823.)